The main problem is that the Hollywood system has already made the film before the director shoots a single frame.

When I was young I used to sit in the cinema thinking wouldn't it be great if you could have a film in which the characters were like real people instead of being like actors.

I try and create for the audience something that relates to real-life experience.

Given the choice of Hollywood or poking steel pins in my eyes, I'd prefer steel pins.

I hope I make films where you walk away . . . with work to do, arguments to have, things to worry about, things to care about. In that sense, I would regard what I do as political.

My work is about life as you and I experience it. You're either lucky or you're not lucky; either your relationship works or it doesn't.

But films should be voyeuristic. What else is a film if you’re not snooping into somebody else’s lives?

There's a constant drip and trickle of life that goes into one's awareness really and consciousness of things.

I discover what my film is by embarking on the journey of making it.

The way an actor is trained doesn't ultimately have much bearing on my work. I'm interested in the actor as artist.

It's an unhealthy habit to say that life is what you make of it, and if you want to be happy, then you can be happy. That's just rubbish, basically.

May you find infinite hope in the Lord.

First gain the victory and then make the best use of it you can.

Look ere thou leap see ere thou go.

What does it take for Republicans to take off the flag pin and say, 'I am just too embarrassed to be on this team'?

For me there's nothing better than putting the white shirt on for England and playing for England. I'd get worried if it wasn't like that.

I started writing when I was about 20, 21 maybe.

A wise man is cured of ambition by ambition itself; his aim is so exalted that riches, office, fortune and favour cannot satisfy him.

I'm not for cutting off hands but I'm more for cutting off hands than I am for molesting children, if that's what it takes to stop it. I think that's fair.

You need to eat what's local. So that's what I'm trying to do - just be as close to nature as possible.

We cannot build our own future without helping others to build theirs.